AFSCME 3357-HOF'S BLOG

GM Pulls $10 Million in Advertising from L.A. Times over Product Criticism

General Motors has pulled all advertising from the Las Angeles Times newspaper for the forseeable future over what it claims are inaccuracies in the paper's editorial coverge. What seems to have stuck in the General's craw the most is the product review of the Pontiac G6 by Dan Niel that is linked below. Here's an excerpt:

GM is a morass of a business case, but one thing seems clear enough, and Lutz's mistake was to state the obvious and then recant: The company's multiplicity of divisions and models is turning into a circular firing squad. How can four nearly identical minivans — one each for Pontiac, Buick, Chevrolet and Saturn — be anything but a waste of resources? Ditto the Four Horsemen of Suburbia, the Buick Rainier, Chevrolet TrailBlazer, GMC Envoy and Saab 9-7X. How does the Pontiac Montana minivan square with Pontiac as the "Excitement" division? Why, exactly, is GMC on this Earth?

(I added the emphasis. Gee, Dan, tell me how you really feel.)

With this attitude towards criticism, onewonders if in a few months whether G.M. will have any forums in which to place their advertising.

An American idle


More Interesting News

I don't have much time, but there's lots of interesting stuff going on.

Another Walmart Scandal over Corruption & Union Busting.

I have a paper subscription to the Wll Street Journal, and the on-line version is a paid-only site. Here's the teaser from today's edition:

A Wal-Mart Legend's Trail of Deceit

Wal-Mart's ex-vice chairman had subordinates create fake invoices to get the firm to pay for personal expenses, papers suggest. The questionable activity appears to involve dozens of transactions, including hunting vacations and alligator boots.

The Vice President would allegedly routinely ask for cash distributions without receipts alleging that they were for "union activities". (The underlying assumption was that they would be used to fund a union-busting slush fund.) We'll hear more about this story later.



Also - A Federal judge Rejected Kirk Kevorkian's claims of Fraud against Daimler Chrysler over the false representations of the "merger of equals."